It's that time of night again, when I'm terribly fackered (yes, I made that up less of a mouthful than fucking knackered) yet unable to sleep.  The Husband has gone out and left the television downstairs on so all I can hear is Peppa Pig, I hope The Kitten is at least enjoying it.  The ridiculously short battery life of my wee netbook is decreasing at an alarming rate and I fear if I rummage for the charger I'll trip over something and break my neck in the dark  I haven't seen my bedroom carpet in months and the debris is akin to quicksand. The thought of exploring it in the dark is a little too white-knuckle-esque for me.

The Toddler is fast asleep next to me having delayed going to sleep with a story, a song, an impromptu trip to the loo for a ripe old shit and implorations for his beaker of water to be refilled all interjected with plenty of breastfeeding.  Still I suppose the subtle lullaby of his sleepy breaths is a tad more enchanting than his vitriolic arguments with The Spawn and his protestations of absolute innocence at anything he may stand accused of having committed in the court of family.

I'm stuck between a double rock and a hard place.  I can't sleep until I know Thing Two is asleep, she has insomnia you see.  However, she'll wait until I manage to extricate myself from the The Toddler to go pee to suddenly pounce and attempt to delay my return to The Toddler (who's chances of waking up increase with every second I'm AWOL) with an insistent stream of random questions and requests.  The other  part  of the double rock and hard place is The Toddlers recent freaky ability to awaken from deepest slumber the instant I attempt to do a runner and refuses to be placated whilst insisting he simply must accompany me.  So whilst sat on the loo, he sits/lays on the bathroom floor in groggy silence, eyes heavy with sleep near rolling in their sockets as his groggy brain creates a speech bubbles that simply says 'Huh?' Then he'll drag an stumble back to bed and go back to sleep as if he'd never woken up.  Even at night I can't piss alone! Still, he usually goes straight  back to sleep without a feed unless of course The Husband attempts to 'help' and comes upstairs to chat to him whilst he waits thus pulling him from grogginess and ensuring I have to start the whole bedtime breastfeed shebang all over again.  Thanks Husband, Love you too.  Still not entirely convinced I'm terribly enthused about the swapping of several night feeds to being stalked.

I'm fantasising about the bottle of Cider that I've had in the fridge for months, or at least I was until I unfortunately remembered it was removed from the fridge to make room for something else and even to one as desperate as I appear to be, warm cider is a little too close to piss in a bottle.  Still, I could however use the bottle to beat Peppa Pig into submission, why is she even awake still? Suddenly I'm salivating for a bacon butty.

Milk Monster

The week isn't by any means over yet and so far it started with The Dog eating Thing Two's sausage roll that was lunch-box bound before school resulting in an impromptu trek to the super market and then to school to drop of a replacement lunch and last night I had to call out a paramedic for The Husband who was having an asthma attack.  In between all that we've got Thing One who's practicing being a vile teenager five years early with utter insolence and sheer obtuseness and The Toddler who has apparently banned all forms of sleep for himself and thus me.  Not to forget The Husband having to rush to school, following a drama-whorish call saying Thing Two was frightfully distressed and in considerable pain due to a toe nail apparently hanging off and could he possibly go there with some nail scissors to 'see what you can do'.  He was in a terrifically bad mood due to suffering from a migraine and had been somewhat of a total twunt so needless to say he was rather bemused to find Thing Two happily sat in her classroom, barefoot, having her lunch with her teacher.  One corner of a toe nail had been digging in to her toe. That was all.  I would have gone myself but I had the time critical task of supervising brownies baking in the oven. Shame.

The Toddler has near completed his training as The Sanity Assassin and having rather cleverly lulled me into a false sense of security at night deciding to do the absolutely unheard of and sleep for 5 hours straight only to then spend the past 5-7 days waking every 60-120 minutes and feeding fervently like a newborn, yes, at 31.5 months of age.  I'm so abysmally tired that my eyes feel like spinning metal balls in their sockets and my limbs feel like concrete blocks of pain.  Add this to the creeping onslaught of yet another M.E trough coupled with an accelerated dip in mood i'm rather more bits then pieces.

There is 'well you could night wean him' road to wander down yet unfortunately he is simply not ready.  You just 'know' when they are and it's untraumatic and surprisingly easy (see also potty training etc etc).  I actually have no qualms with a waking or two during the night and a quick boobie snack with added snuggles, however I do become considerably grumpsome when it becomes every 60-120 minutes, as you would.  We've tried the counting up to ten method which is what worked when Thing Two was a toddler and indeed The Toddler is on occasion been known to be somewhat amenable to this idea, which is nice.  It also proves our suspicions that he indeed absolutely understands the proposal.  However, more oft then not lately he'll simply shake his head and mumble around a mouthful of boob 'no'.  If I try and subtly remove said boob then well...all hell breaks loose.  Arse.

There is a possibility that he's still teething, again.  For now i'll go with that idea with it being terrifically more endearing then the alternative 'he hates me'

So for now he shall remain, the boob junkie boobie monster.

It has taken me several days to write this.  The Husband is now en route to Austria and i'm home, alone, avec The Spawn, and I have no chocolate.  This could get messy.  Thankfully The Grandparents are coming to my rescue and having Things One & Two for the night.  They're all currently in the bathroom (The Spawn, not The GrandParents) as The Toddler fights them for the bog.  I'm best off not knowing really.  I'm pretending to ignore the arguments and the 'MuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuM!!!!!!' calls.  Is it vodka o clock yet?  Oh Bollocks. I'm practicing neglect by hiding behind the laptop.  Tomorrow i'll be all smiles and weave lentils with them.  Honest.